


Out Of Sync

by isxbella



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: M/M, Ninejack, They love each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-17
Updated: 2020-05-17
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:42:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24238984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isxbella/pseuds/isxbella
Summary: The Doctor meets a Jack that isn’t his but is very much a fixed point, and questions are raised.
Relationships: The Doctor/Jack Harkness
Comments: 2
Kudos: 28





	Out Of Sync

**Author's Note:**

> Apparently in this fic, I wrote it so that Jack’s vortex manipulator is perfectly functioning? In my head, Jack fixes it while at Torchwood (Tosh probably helps) but is accustomed to his linear lifestyle and only ever really makes brief jumps in space (not time).

It was a busy little marketplace, so cheerful and chattering that Jack almost felt sorry he was about to assassinate it’s manager. Of course, officially he had never stepped foot on the planet and one of his wives would be done for the murder, but that would be tomorrow’s news. 

It wasn’t that he was a bounty hunter now. The Doctor has rubbed off on him enough so that he’d never even consider that as a profession. He was simply tying everything nicely up from Torchwood’s latest assignment by tracking down the alien traitor and making a point of what happened to those who misused their single chance for redemption. 

Jack was so busy scanning the colourful stalls that lined the winding streets for his treacherous target, that he didn’t see what was right in front of his nose until he hit it. 

The being with whom he’d collided fell backwards, backside stopping their fall. Jack looked down into the gravel and blinked. 

The Doctor blinked too, bringing up a hand to shield his blue eyes. Jack offered him a hand and he took it, as a reflex, standing up and brushing gravel off his giant leather jacket.

“Sorry about that, Doc,” Jack said resignedly, although he had no idea if this Doctor had met him yet. “The fall and the wrongness.”

He said it in a blasé tone, because after the Master and the year onboard the Valiant, he had long since got over the fact he was a fact and had taken the Doctor time to get used to.

“Jack?” The Doctor said the word as if he was uncertain on its pronunciation. “How did you get here so fast? I just left you asleep in our bed- and now you’re here and all… fixed.”

Jack swallowed, unsure if he could even tell the time-lord the truth for the sake of their respective timelines. 

“Are you saving anything at the moment, because it’s a long explanation, Doc,” Jack sighed when he realised he wouldn’t be able to lie to this Doctor, the first Doctor he loved. 

“I’m just out for groceries- bananas and the like,” the Doctor said with his trademark grin that Jack missed dearly, but also with a hint of curiosity and worry on Jack’s behalf. He flourished an arm holding a recyclable shopping bag, which by some small miracle hadn’t split its contents over the floor.

“Right,” Jack said, before continuing to walk along the street. The Doctor matched his stride easily and reached out to hold Jack’s hand with his free one, causing Jack to pull his hand sharply away. 

“I’m not your Jack,” he stated. “I’m about two hundred years older than the guy who gave you that hickey.” 

The Doctor grinned furiously at his last comment, pulling at the neck of his shirt with an expression that resembled pride. “You’re human, Jack, no offence- but you should be dead.”

Jack laughed. Not that his current Doctor with his fantastic brown hair and glasses he wore to try to look smart wasn’t perfect, but he’d missed this Doctor and his Northern accent. 

“Yeah, funny thing about that, Doc. Universe won’t let me die. Starvation, nope. Bullet through my heart, still not dead. The plague? Woke right back up.”

“You do grate awfully on my time sense,” the Doctor remarked casually. “But, how-“

“Spoilers,” Jack interrupted.

“No, don’t you dare,” the Doctor retaliated almost viciously, standing in front of Jack to block his path. “How did I let this happen to you?”

Jack tried to come up with the shortest answer possible. “It was Rose, and she meant no harm by it.”

“So where was I? Where am I? Is he just round the corner, your Doctor, because I’d like to have a few words with him about the dangers of running into his past self,” the Doctor demanded with a ferocity that surprised Jack.

He squared his shoulders and stared into the Doctor’s eyes as he spoke. “I wouldn’t know, haven’t seen him in a while.”

The Doctor stepped back as if wounded. “What?”

“All this wrongness, me being a fact… it hurt him, will hurt you,” Jack said, ignoring the pain in his heart as he admitted the awful truth. 

The Doctor seemed to be scrambling desperately for answers. “Why would I… I love you-“

Jack couldn’t help it. He grabbed the Doctor by his leather jacket and claimed his lips in a hot kiss. Without thinking, his tongue asked for permission to enter the other man’s mouth and the Doctor submitted right away. He tasted of bananas and adventure, and Jack let out a muffled groan as the Doctor’s hands entwined themselves in his hair- trying to bring their bodies closer.

Before it could go further, Jack broke the kiss and rested his forehead against the time-lord’s. His pupils had dilated and it took a minute to steady his breath.

The Doctor leant in for another kiss, but Jack pulled gently away until they were no longer touching. 

“You can’t remember this, or you’ll mess up the timelines, and as you can see mine is enough of a pain as it is,” Jack said jokingly, but the Doctor sighed- knowing he was right.

“I’ll be fine,” Jack promised with a rueful grin. “And I love you too, Doc. See you around.”

The pair of immortals parted, and when- mere weeks later- Rose absorbed the vortex, the TARDIS made the Doctor’s boyfriend immortal and the Doctor regenerated to perfectly fit Jack’s type, the timelines continued undisturbed- with Jack stuck on Earth and the Doctor running from him and his wrongness. 

Until years later, after Donna, when the TARDIS gave her thief a shock by returning a memory long hidden away by himself- and thus giving him a mission. 

For Jack it was only minutes later he heard the familiar wheeze of the TARDIS materialising behind him and a time-lord stuck his head out with a merry, “Still love me, handsome?”


End file.
